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Former President Goodluck Jonathan has rejected some of the conditions given to him by members of the Aso Rock (Presidency) cabal to get the 2023 presidential automatic ticket of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), SaharaReporters has gathered.
One of the conditions was that Jonathan must officially defect to the APC with some Peoples Democratic Party governors in the South-South and South-East regions.
The cabal, comprising some members of President Muhammadu Buhari’s extended family and friends, are the powers behind the throne.
This group is said to have the ear of the President, influence policy-making and determine those who get major appointments.
Sources told SaharaReporters that the former President rejected the conditions and told the cabal he doesn’t have interest in the 2023 presidency again.
His response, it was gathered, embarrassed the cabal members who described the former President as a traitor.
“They are now accusing Jonathan of not fulfilling some of his promises after all the several meetings and soft-landing given to him.
“He was to come on board by converting some PDP states in the South-South and South-East to APC, and that way he would get the automatic ticket uncontested. Some other conditions were also given to him.
“But guess what? He told them he won’t contest again. They are now angry, saying he was deceitful. They said after getting some of his seized monies back, his wife’s monies returned to him, he finally decided not to contest,” a top source told SaharaReporters on Thursday.
SaharaReporters had reported that members of the ‘Aso Rock cabal’ had promised Jonathan the 2023 presidential ticket of the ruling APC.
It was also reported that the cabal members had warned the President against handing over to the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo and Bola Tinubu, the national leader of the party.
“Buhari’s cabal members have asked Jonathan to prepare for the party’s ticket. They said they don’t want Tinubu or Osibanjo,” a presidential source had told SaharaReporters.
SaharaReporters earlier reported how the cabal had been pressuring Jonathan to defect to the APC.
He was said to have surprised the northern elite and the cabal by his disposition to the Buhari presidency despite all the dirt and campaign of calumny thrown at him and the PDP before the 2015 presidential election, which gave Buhari an unprecedented victory over an incumbent.
It was learnt that some cabal members had also been impressed that despite the Buhari government’s glaring failure, Jonathan had not openly criticised his predecessor or his administration, much unlike ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Obasanjo had written open letters condemning the Buhari government and also verbally berated it at any opportunity.
SaharaReporters learnt from sources that the establishment of ‘Almajiri’ schools by Jonathan to reduce a large number of out-of-school children in the North also scored the former president good points in the eyes of the northern cabal in the APC, especially with most of it now rotting away, even under a northerner as president.
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